GnuDiff writes: "There are several groups of people whose main and preferred package for producing documents is TeX, but "Eight hours with TeX" describes what does the time-honoured package feels like for somebody who just tried it out."

By now, you've probably already heard of Microsoft's former 'top secret' project, known as Surface, which is a table-shaped computer that boasts a 30 touch screen for interactive 'touch' computing. It's certainly a great idea, but everyone seems to be missing the fact that this technology has been done before, in a prototype known as Bumptop.

The YouTube video (shown above) of Bumptop was added just a little under 1 year ago, and has since become the #1 watched video with over 1.8 million views to date.

The Microsoft Surface video (shown above) looks exactly like Bumptop, despite being a bit more polished.

Microsoft claims its idea for Surface came about in 2001, but oddly enough, no one from Microsoft, or anywhere else for that matter had mentioned this technology in the past. The idea is being played off as a 'top secret' project from Microsoft, justifying the delay in the announcement.

So was Surface dreamed up after Bumptop? Would you put it past Microsoft to copy someone else's technology, fabricate a history for it, and 1 year later release its 'future computing interface?'

alphadogg writes: Makers of some of the most popular extension software used by the Firefox browser are not doing enough to secure their software, according to a security researcher. The problem is that many widely used Firefox extensions, including toolbars from Google, Yahoo, and AOL, do not use secure connections to update themselves, according to Christopher Soghoian, a security researcher best known for having attracted the attention of the FBI late last year after publishing a tool that could be used to print fake boarding passes.
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